Nesvizh Castle
Нясвіжскі палацава-паркавы комплекс
- UNESCO World Heritage
Interesting facts
- Nesvizh had its own cannon foundry, the first in Belarus, which cast its first series of guns in 1576.
- Its late-16th-century guns were cast with names such as Crocodile, Salamander, Parrot, Owl and Hydra, many bearing menacing Latin mottoes on the barrel.
- Seven of those named cannons survive far from home: five in the Polish Army Museum in Warsaw, one in Stockholm and one in St Petersburg.
- In the 17th century the castle's artillery numbered more than 100 guns; by 1733 only about 30 remained.
- In 1772 Russian troops carried off the Radziwiłł library of some 20,000 books to St Petersburg, where it stayed in the Academy of Sciences.
- Jérôme Bonaparte, Napoleon's brother, set up his headquarters in the castle for several days in July 1812.
- After 1812 the confiscated Radziwiłł coin and medal collection, 12,209 pieces in all, was sent to Kharkiv University.
- The writer Julian Niemcewicz described twelve two-foot apostles of pure gold in the family treasury; their fate after 1812 has never been established.
- After the Red Army arrested the family in 1939, an appeal by Queen Elena of Italy, a friend of Princess Maria Róża, secured their release abroad.
- By a twist of fate, the Soviet commissar put in charge of the castle in 1939 was named Sirotka, the founder's own nickname, 'the Orphan'.
Why it is worth it
Nesvizh Castle was the principal seat of the Radziwiłłs, the wealthiest magnate family of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and it is the grandest aristocratic residence surviving in Belarus. Its yellow Baroque ranges close around a courtyard entered through a gatehouse tower, with ponds and landscaped parkland around it. Together with the Corpus Christi Church in the town it was inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2005, recognised for its influence on the architecture of Central and Eastern Europe.
The Radziwiłłs held Nesvizh from 1533. In 1582 Mikołaj Krzysztof Radziwiłł, nicknamed "the Orphan", began replacing the old fortress with a square three-storey palace, finished by 1604, whose corners were defended by octagonal towers; for a time the state archive of the Grand Duchy, the Lithuanian Metrica, was kept here. Swedish troops of Charles XII sacked the castle in 1706 during the Great Northern War, and in the rebuilding that followed the separate wings were joined into one building and the façades received their Baroque stucco.
Russian forces seized the castle in 1792 and the family was expelled; its art collections were dispersed and the archives removed to St Petersburg. The Radziwiłłs later returned, and in the 1880s Prince Antoni Wilhelm Radziwiłł and his French wife Marie de Castellane renovated the interiors and laid out an English landscape park of more than a square kilometre. Expelled again by the Red Army in 1939, the family lost the castle for good; in Soviet times it served as a sanatorium.
A long restoration between 2004 and 2012 rebuilt the castle, which now operates as a museum, and its parks can be explored on foot. In the town, the Corpus Christi Church, built in 1584–93 as one of the first Baroque churches in the Commonwealth, is the burial place of many members of the Radziwiłł family, while the Slutsk Gate and town hall add to a short walking circuit.
Getting there
The castle is on the edge of Nesvizh (Niasviž), about 1 km from the town centre. Minsk National Airport (MSQ) is about 116 km away. Four or five buses a day run from Minsk to Nesvizh, taking about 90 minutes; alternatively, take a suburban train from Minsk to Haradzieja (Gorodeya) and a connecting bus, about 25 minutes, to Nesvizh. By car, turn off the M1/E30 Minsk–Brest highway.
On these lists
From the encyclopaedia
Nesvizh Castle or Nyasvizh Castle is a residential castle of the Radziwiłł family in Nyasvizh (Nesvizh), Belarus. It is 183 metres (600 ft) above sea level. Built originally in the 16th and 17th centuries, throughout its history the site has been sacked, damaged and abandoned repeatedly, and has seen multiple different uses including as a storehouse. Finally it has been extensively rebuilt and restored from 2004–2012. In 2005, the castle, church, and surrounding environment were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. The castle and the nearby Corpus Christi Church were instrumental in the development of Central European and Russian architecture.
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